A Dunn Deal

When Mary Dunn joined Entertainment Weekly as picture editor in September 1990, the seven-month-old magazine was still teething, and the future, she recalls, ''looked a little wobbly.'' Nearly a decade later, EW is thriving, in no small part due to the award-winning photographic style that Dunn -- with her brisk, can-do attitude -- brought to its pages. She's been so central to our success, we're still a bit shocked to realize that Mary is hanging up her photo loupe and retiring. ''I hit 30 years,'' she says of her tenure at Time Inc., ''and that was plenty.'' Though she jokingly claims to have begun her career ''back during the Punic Wars,'' Dunn earned her first stripes as a photo researcher for TIME in 1969. Five years later, she left to join a humble upstart called PEOPLE, soon becoming its picture editor. When EW beckoned during a second tour of duty at TIME, a lesser soldier might have stuck with a sure thing. Dunn embraced the risk. ''Having been involved in starting PEOPLE,'' she says, ''I knew there's nothing quite so exciting.'' She quickly made her mark. ''When Mary arrived,'' says EW managing editor Jim Seymore, ''we didn't have a clear pictorial philosophy. She turned things around in a hurry.'' Dunn began by bringing in such esteemed photographers as Mary Ellen Mark and Matthew Rolston. She also pushed for distinctive black-and-white covers, to set EW apart on newsstands. ''She has an incredible 'eye,''' says Seymore. ''I could always trust her instincts.''

And she handled a lifetime's worth of crises and craziness. Like the logistical nightmare known as Fall TV Preview -- you're reading the latest version -- a project that takes months to plan. Or the weekly cover sessions. ''Of all the shoots, the longest was Mariah Carey,'' Dunn recalls. ''It went seven hours. She was perfectly pleasant, but it was a long day.''

A Camden, S.C., native and a graduate of Sweet Briar College, Mary lives in Manhattan with her husband, Toby, an ad exec. (Daughter Muffie, 25, is in TV production.) We wish them all the best, but be forewarned: We intend to call Mary back for special projects. We still need her. ''It's not too much to say,'' adds Seymore, ''that everyone that ever worked here -- or ever will